Not My Title
by Kuro Guardian
Summary: And his father wept.


Tenzin

Everyone says that the past is important. They say that a great crime was committed and it's part of his destiny to fix that. They say that he owes it to his people to be the best. They say that tradition is something praiseworthy. They say they expect great things of him. His father smiles when he hears that and says of course they can expect greatness from him. His father calls him a prodigy. His mother smiles, but her eyes are studying Bumi –who is frowning again – and Kya.

So he is ten years old and sitting alone in his room, because he was wrong to push back. It doesn't matter that Bumi is older and stronger physically and a jerk who lies. He is the Airbender and much is expected of him. He is, as Bumi said, the Next to Last Airbender. He is to be the father of a nation, and so he can't let his temper escape him. He can't skip his training like Kya or disappear for hours like Bumi. He has to work hard so he can get his tattoos and his father can rest assured his people's ways will continue beyond him. It isn't fair.

And that's the mantra he'll repeat as he sneaks out following the currents only one other person can feel. This island has a dozen, dozen secret paths and he is mentally saying goodbye to Oogi as he skimps the surface of the bay. He's ten years old and he's going away for a day or a while or forever. Whatever comes first.

The knitted cap on his head is itchy, but it saves on questions and he gets enough of them regarding his boots. They were the heaviest he could find, and he still all but skips along the ground. The only help is that he is normally obedient and so no one will think to check on him yet. Even then if Aunt Toph gets involved or worse Lin he's doomed. Someone laughs and tries to strike him – then someone pushes him back and swings on the bully. Five minutes later he is deeper in the city then he ever thought possible. It's like a world with no adults – hundreds of kids darting about, because a thousand kids run to and from Republic City every fucking day. At least that's what Jeta says and he would know as this is his bimonthly trip to the City.

A thousand kids running to and from Republic City every day – so it's easy as sin to catch on with a group heading to Ba Se Sing by train. He's shivering with what might be nerves or cold or something else… something like excitement maybe. He can still feel Jeta's hands on his shoulder as he whispers advice and warnings and asks for the tenth time if "Tenchi" can't just wait. Except he can't because there are already a dozen extra steelers on the street stopping boys his age and pulling down hoods. There are six kids beside him in the cramped car, and they have to be quiet or something bad will happen. One of the girls says they should be safe pass the city limits.

She's wrong.

They get caught somewhere along the broken line between Fire Nation and Earth Nation. Three men with barely fourteen teeth between them and an abundance of pointless hatred stand over them with glee. The one who thought they'd be safe is saying something, but it isn't enough and maybe he should try blowing them away. Maybe, maybe, maybe and then it's much too late and …

And…

And he's never flown without a glider and he doesn't start here – it's all he can do to break his fall along with another boy his age. It still hurts hitting the water if only because it's so cold. Cold enough to nearly stop his breath – but he is ten years old and the Next to Last Airbender. He isn't allowed to die yet. The water is red, black, and purple because the rest hit the water hard enough to burst. The next ten minutes are blurred from fatigue and horror, but he revisits them enough in later nightmares to be grateful for that. One thing that can't be ignored is that the water is filled with teeth. He ends up losing his boots and a few toes. The other boy only loses an ear and part of his nose. At least he held onto his money – he'll miss the stuff he left on the train though and the boots.

It takes them three days – Nebi crying all the way – to make it to Gailong where supposedly Aunt Toph is from. It is a small place and right now that is all he wants. Nebi is burning up and Tenzin can feel himself getting sick. It might be his feet… they are swollen with a bad smelling pus coming from his wounds. He didn't bring enough money, but they have something and the house Aunt Toph lived in is abandoned. Sure they have to share it with fox-mice and cabbits and a sea of dust, but it is fairly safe and there is stuff to burn for warmth. He can also use the fire to heat water for bathing or cooking. He can also use the fire to heat the knife he has bought. He doesn't scream, not that Nebi would notice.

Four days they spend in the rambling home, holed up in a chamber Tenzin can swear echoes with the sound of a mischievous child's laughter. Part of him thinks it sounds like Lin. Part of him thinks it sounds like Fate. Either way it's just loud enough to hide Nebi's wheezing – or maybe that's just the guilt talking. It's better than admitting he didn't even hear the other boy die. The painful expression frozen on the withered little face tells of a horrible struggle, and Tenzin is sorry he left him alone to it. He swears he'll never leave someone to such a thing ever again. He covers Nebi with his jacket and moves out into the hallway.

Two days later he curses the ground and the sky and every waking Spirit. There is no way to bury Nebi. An hour passes and Tenzin decides there is no point in burying him anyway. So he wanders around the overgrown courtyard cutting the heavy vegetation with angry swipes of his arms. His skin is the color of plaster, but he doesn't have time to worry about that. Monks don't steal, but he doesn't have any more money and he needs fuel for this. Besides alcohol is bad – his father said. Earth burns surprising well if you feed enough wind to it. He watches the compound burn, and muses on an idea.

Five days later a tall woman stands on the ashes of her childhood home, and calm begins cursing with every bit of profanity she knows. Behind her a child studies the sky as she ignores her uncle's desperate weeping over shards of bone. Three days down the road two more bodies are burning and Tenzin is apologizing for seeing their shame. He isn't supposed to see this, and he knows his mother would hate this. He feels like he should apologize for that too, but he is trying to understand why anyone would hurt a child. Yunni is 16 or was and she tried to mother him. She is the one who thought everything would be alright. They hurt her a lot. Tagune is - was 13 and she had a gap between her front teeth she could whistle with. Her eyes had been a deep blue almost purple. There is only one hole and it gapes. They did not deserve this.

And something quiet inside him dies, because this isn't fair. Nobody deserves this…but Airbenders don't kill. They don't kill, but nobody said anything about maiming. No one said anything about torture. No one said anything about leaving people to die. He is eleven and it has taken over six months to find them. Four months of accidents and running from screams and learning not to vomit or cry over what he has done. Two months to slowly, but surely beat the little voice in his head to death. Air nomads might be pacifists, but he's just an airbender and these bastards started it.

At least he doesn't kill them. He just calls to the gases within them, and he watches them bend into painful mockeries of the human form. It isn't nearly enough. So he pulls hard and then the first limb explodes. It's fine. He knows how to burn the ragged stumps closed. They're far away from anyone who'd really care and he has all the time in the world. It takes another two days before he's satisfied, and he wonders why he doesn't feel bad. Then he remembers they deserve it. Besides he hasn't killed them – if they succumb to viper-rats or starvation or a fortunate mercy killing or infection… well that really isn't his problem.

It takes a month to reach to Ba Se Sing and he has robbed four men and a woman in only the last few days. Monks don't steal, but he isn't a monk and he never will be. He could go through the gate, but it's easier to just jump the fucking wall. He wonders how much the firebending army of the Hundred Year war wished they could do the same. That thought doesn't last long, because he's always hungry. He manages to find a tea house with a kind owner who lets him bathe and eat and sleep for a week there. It shouldn't be so hurtful that Great-Uncle Iroh doesn't recognize him. So he decides it isn't and sneaks out of a back window with a pocketful of coins. The streets swallow him up.

He is twelve and an hour ago he slit a man's throat. Airbenders don't kill with their bending, but no one said anything about knives. Besides the fucker deserved it – you should never hurt a child especially not like that. It doesn't matter, even if Tenzin has scrubbed his hands raw. What matters is that there are now four airbenders in the world according to the paper staring him in the face. His father looks so happy right now, and his mother is finally looking at someone who isn't Bumi or Kya. Twins and – and he walks away from the burning newsstand rubbing his hands together. He needs more practice, but he can make fire now on command. It's so damn easy.

How no one thought of this before is beyond him. Sure a firebender couldn't be an airbender, but damn if an airbender couldn't be something of a firebender. What is fire after all? Air and fuel and a fierce want. That's all. Sure he can only use it from his hands, but that's more than enough to kill off the specter of Tenzin and all the stupid rules that surround him. Not that it really matters – they've already replaced him. He starts a fight and is rocked to sleep with kicks to the teeth.

Thirteen years old and he is twitching under the needle of some half-mad idiot on a dare. The word Legacy is being etched down the length of his spine in giant characters, and if there is some bit of bitterness behind the choice oh well. For the last week the Avatar's family has been slathered across every newspaper as the "Airbabies" celebrate their first birthday. All the more luck to them – at least they have someone to help shoulder the burden of being last.

Too bad that won't save them from being puppeted by the fucking White Lotus assholes. Catching his breath as the needle digs a little deeper, but it doesn't matter – nothing hurts as much as seeing everyone so blessed happy without him. The needle stops – "Damn Tenchi you're insane." A smile more teeth than humor is the only answer, before the boy turns to look at the tattooist – "Think you could put something on my hands?"

He is tired of the whispers and he thinks he knows how to stop them. So he has a tat of Kiyoshi placed on his right hand as a restraint and he has a tat of Yangchen placed on his left hand as an encouragement. And it hurts like fuck, but damn if he isn't used to it by now. There is nothing quite like perverting your element to teach you the meaning of pain. When it is done his head is finally quiet and he feels like he can make it. The sharp pain in his left hand is his only warning when he steps outside and is jumped.

Fourteen and basically alone sits the King of the Underneath. It's easy…so easy. All it took was the realization that most people are cowards. Though, of course, that is only to be expected. After all, from crib to grave these idiots have been taught to wait for the Avatar to save their useless asses. They don't know how to stand up for themselves, and so they bowed to him like grass before the wind. Of course, it helped being able to kill without laying a hand on a person. Sure the first time had been an accident, but what better excuse then not wanting to die on his knees.

The Void – air's answer to Lightening and Metalbending and Bloodbending. A perfect kill shot every time and he could do it without a single twitch. Everyone who matters knows that and that… That has him sitting on a rooftop with some girl lying behind him under his coat. What's the point of power if all it brings is boredom? Rubbing the tattoo of Yangchen on his right hand the boy can only sigh waiting for whatever would be killer is hunting him now.

Only the sudden sharp twang of nerves allows him warning. There is someone gasping with their fist six inches deep where he'd been seated. He knows that silhouette and he wants nothing to do with it. He's running like a fucking coward, and there is no way he'll be able to come back from this. It doesn't matter. It doesn't matter because no one can defeat the Avatar. They can however outrun him maybe. And it's hard, but this is the first thing to really give him a thrill in over a year. He knows this city like the maze of his racing heart, and he is fast – too fast the way only an airbender can be. And it nearly isn't enough except that he's in the catacombs and then he's in the train yards catching the first thing moving. And he's going to get caught if he doesn't stop laughing, but it doesn't matter because his life is singing through his veins.

And that singing only gets louder when he steps off the train and runs into his own face on a wanted poster. They couldn't seem to agree on a name since there isn't one. Then again maybe they just don't want to consider him a murderer just yet. Idiots. He starts calling himself Koh and buys a pack he stuffs with maps. Before he leaves the pissant little town he's landed in he has the word Tenzin branded over his heart. It's the least he can do since he isn't too sure about his wilderness skills.

Fifteen finds him wandering through a world equal parts tired and new. He is tall and lean with a smile that lures sweethearts like honey draws bees. His curly black hair and bright blue eyes encourage adults to trust him, while his tattoos and scars draw the boys along in his wake. Wherever he goes he's a star, but more importantly he's a fast learner. He learns how to fix radios and cars. He learns how to send spirits on their way. He learns how deliver baby animals and then baby humans and then he is sixteen delivering his first born. And he fucks up…so.

So now he is sixteen and wondering whether or not to drown the kid. It's barely alive as it is and he really doesn't have time for a brat. Also it isn't much to look at – bald as an egg and grey it's too small from being too early. Stranger still it's fuzzy like a peach, and horribly skinny. It'd probably be kinder to just drop it in the lake over yonder; but if he didn't want a kid he shouldn't have knocked up Rei. Rei who is already a cheerfully burning pyre. The baby suddenly sneezes stirring up a stiff breeze.

It's pretty pathetic, but at least it means a way out. Everyone knows the Avatar is desperate for airbenders like himself – it's why his oldest children resent him and his younger children are so frantic to please him. He'll love this little bastard. Kiyoshi agrees sending a hideous ache through his right hand, even as Yangchen sits silent on his left. Of course, she wouldn't approve – she has never been fond of Aang… but hell why should she be?

Two months of wandering and condolences and this sickly little fucker clawing its way into his heart. It is a dry year, and the dust is unending. For once he doesn't bother pretending to be a firebender; because he's pretty sure any dust this brat inhales will kill it. Somewhere between now and before he collected a couple of bounties, so he pays a half-decent water bender to do something about the kid's lungs.

Eventually the fuzz falls off and the baby could almost pass for normal if it would just stop sneezing so damn much. The attention it draws is enough to add an extra month of travel since they have to hide in the Sea of Trees with what seems like every evil spook that every existed. He ends up burning half of it down, but that's just fucking progress. Even then they eventually reach Republic City and now comes the hard part.

Luck is with him as the blasted Avatar is somewhere hunting ghosts or whatever it is he does. Security is so ridiculously worthless he almost decides to keep the kid. All it takes is a prod from Kiyoshi to remind him of his reasons. So he drops the kid off on the front porch with a note and then he skedaddles over to Oogi's pin. "Fuck you've grown." That might be an understatement. Oogi used to be the size of a dog and now he's as big as a house. Which is a shame; because there is no way in hell he can come away with him now. There just isn't anyway to hide something this fucking big. Still it's nice to see his old friend and it isn't like this will be the last time probably.

It isn't – the Newspapers are having a fit even through this has to be the… fourth? Yeah, the fourth kid he has left on that Spirit forsaken island. This one is a girl – the first one so far. All the rest have been boys and he doesn't know whether to be proud of that or not. Still he's got to stop sleeping around or start making sure his girls are on something, because this shit is getting old. He nearly got caught this time. Not that it's really his fault – he isn't a twenty year old has been. How was he supposed to know Lin would be on the fucking island or that she'd check up on Oogi that night?

Maybe he hadn't needed to snatch all the air out of her lungs, but he kinda maybe panicked a bit. It happens. Doesn't really matter either way – he has prey to hunt. A little whisper of the boy he was mutters that hunting is wrong, but considering his prey is the very worst sort of men… whatever. Nothing is likely to be as fun as Yakone and his little mongrels, but it can't always be fun and games. And if he is maybe giving firebenders a bad name what of it? It isn't like they don't deserve it, and it isn't his fault everyone thinks he's a fucking firebender.

Time passes as a series of fights and hunting and quietly stalking his children (and somehow he has added another two to the collection). He tries to ignore the papers and their lies about an Avatar with failing health. His father is barely past forty. There is nothing wrong with him, certainly nothing the Great Healer Katara can't fix. Anyone who says otherwise is fucking lying. Eventually he catches a train to Republic City. It's exactly the same, and totally different, and he is soon sporting a black eye courtesy of Lin.

And yeah he maybe let everyone think he was dead for five or six years. And okay he burned down a couple of dozen (hundred) things (people). And okay so he could have come to a funeral or two or three or shit – okay so he deserves his shiner something awful. He might have said goodbye, but then again he's spent almost twice as many years away from these people as he has with them. Trying to explain that only leaves him swallowing blood and hoping against loose teeth. Whatever. Fuck Lin and her temper… and that pretty little ass she's developed.

Being the Avatar's brat has its benefits it seems because he's under house arrest while they try to drum up some way to blackmail him into staying. Unless that blackmail includes Lin wearing nothing but a smile it honestly isn't going to work. Still there are pros and cons to being stuck on the hunk of rock he ran from over 15 years ago. On the one hand there is finally meeting his children and they are wonderful – so he has done the right thing by leaving them here. They talk like scholars and nobles with perfect posture and they smile with their eyes as well as their lips. They're good kids… they don't play with knives and chance just to feel something that isn't despair. It was the right choice. But that's the only good news, because on the other hand the old man is in fact dying.

His mother doesn't know where to look. She flinches from Aang's eyes even as she clenches his hand and she can't meet Tenzin's eyes because – well. And something bitter and small knows she wouldn't because she never has. He is her husband's son not hers. Kya looks around a Tenzin-shaped hole as she works at cheerfulness like it might save the world or one tired old man. Bumi isn't here of course, because he's a fucking coward. And no that isn't fair, but fair is just a story told to lucky children.

"Tenzin." The thing at the door doesn't even sound like the Avatar. Worse he looks like a scarecrow and the struggle it takes him to reach Tenzin has Yangchen and Kiyoshi weeping. He weighs less than a child and he fits on Tenzin's lap and this isn't fair. There should have been more time, but – even if there had been more time he would have wasted it like always. He'll be twenty seven in another week…and there aren't enough candles in the world.

"Why did you leave?"

"I was scared. I didn't want to be the Last Airbender."

And his Father wept.


End file.
